June 16, 2021 - Bobcat released its latest OTA update at 8 pm PDT on 6/16 to continue its miner optimization.

The following optimization occurred in this update:

1. Miners will check for hotspot firmware releases from Helium every day at 6 am and 6 pm PDT, instead of one time a day at 9pm PDT.

2. Miners will update to a designated helium firmware version to facilitate a smoother snapshot loading process.

3. Miners will check every 2 hours if the firmware is updated to the latest designated version.

4. This update allowed us to relocate EU868 and US915 hotspot servers from Alicloud to AWS to ensure a smoother remote miner health check and optimization going forward.

Lastly, the Helium firmware version display on the bobcat miner will be corrected after the next routine update. The current display of 2019.11.06.0 is incorrect and does not reflect the miner’s actual firmware version. Once the hotspot receives the next Helium firmware update, the version display will be auto corrected to the one used, ie. 2021.06.xx.

Hotspots connected to Ethernet/Wifi will receive these updates automatically. No manual intervention is needed.

For all customers, we advise the following steps:

1. Make sure your miner is connected to the internet to receive updates. Updates will be received as long as the hotspot is connected to the internet.

2. Please allow 24 hours to see the results from this update.

Additional Notes:

Operating Temperature:

As shown in the databook, the max operating temperature for the indoor Bobcat Miner 300 is 60C. Do NOT place it outside if it risks heat exposure, which will cause CPU crashing. For more technical readings on the impact of temperature variations on the reliability of LoRa, click here.

Install the Antenna Gently

When installing the stock antenna, gently screw it on. We have seen cases where excessive force was applied and caused the connector area to become loose or even crack from the inside. The RF cable connector inside the casing could be damaged if twisted excessively.

Read the following excerpt from Helium

To gain a deeper understanding of how relayed hotspots affect earnings, why challenges fail, and/or why beacon results are sometimes 0.

Relayed Hotspots & the Importance of Opening Ports

Relayed Hotspots do not just affect the Hotspot owner, but can also affect its neighbors and the network.

Relayed Hotspot as a Challenger

When a relayed Hotspot issues a challenge, the receipt (or acknowledgment of the challenge) by the challengee and witnessing Hotspots may not arrive in time to be accepted. This is due to the receipt having to traverse various other Hotspot connections to arrive at the relayed challenger.

Any witnesses that heard the beacon will have issues submitting their receipts to the challenger in a timely manner.

The Challenger does not earn HNT, Challengee does not earn HNT, witnesses do not earn HNT!

Relayed Hotspot as a Challengee (Beaconer)

A Challenger that sends a request to the Challengee expects an acknowledgment or a receipt by the Challangee within a certain period of time.

If the Challengee is relayed, the initial request can take too long to arrive at the relayed Hotspot, and the request becomes stale and invalid.

The Challenger does not earn HNT, Challengee does not earn HNT, witnesses that respond do not earn HNT.

Relayed Hotspot as a Witness

Hotspots that witness Beacons have to submit their receipt to the Challenger in a timely manner in order to earn HNT.

If the witnessing Hotspot is relayed, then they are unlikely to submit their receipt in time.